Sugar Hit

We all know the dangers of taking too much sugar all at once. There is a sense in which we can gain a sudden burst of energy and then exhaustion quickly follows. After a long period of fasting and abstinence there can be a sense in which we have run a marathon of 40 days and then can see the sudden burst to the finish line as our goal. It is almost all the preparation and training for Easter is all exhausted in one day. However, Easter is not just a flash in the pan: here today and gone tomorrow. In fact Easter lasts for 50 days! It is a time in which we allow Jesus to find us and lead us closer to the Father. While the season of Lent is more about looking at what prevents from seeing God at work in our lives, Easter is more about allowing ourselves to be more open to God's promptings. It is a time when we are called to be open to God's spirit working in and through us. This culminates at Pentecost where God sends his spirit upon the disciples. This is not just a private gift reserved to the lucky few, it is a commissioning to live that life of grace for others. During the Season of Easter we need to be open to the gifts of living this grace for others. We are called to be disciples who walk with Jesus. To be more comfortable with the life entrusted to us as members of a Christian community. Each person has gifts given them for the good of others. 

Going along with the crowd

All of us want to be cheering for the same team or at least be on the winning side. There is a sense where a sporting event, a concert or even an election can engage us completely in the moment. Something happens on these occasions which connects us not only to each other but also to a deeper sense of what it means to be alive. We want to be present and experience what is going on and to be changed by that occasion.
The question, however, are we there as spectators or participants, as tourist or as pilgrims? An experience can be life changing if draws us into a place where we can reflect upon it more deeply. No longer is it just something that just happened but it calls us to live differently now. This is how we are called to move into Holy Week. We can become aware that in many ways that this is a time of awful injustice, cruelty and torture. We can observe how the crowds, the authorities and even his own disciples abandon Jesus and the time of his greatest need. But this is more than just a human reality. It calls us to ponder on how God's love transforms this event rather than just be amazed by it. We are called to relate deeply with the person of Jesus whose life, death and resurrection reaches out to us. It changes us from the inside out. It allows us to encounter, struggle and become in communion with the God who walks with us even in our darkest night!

How will my life bear fruit?

Unless a grain of wheat dies it remains only a single grain. This is one of the constant dilemmas of modern life how do I gain what I want without losing what I already have. There is a sense in which we are told we can have it all without making a commitment to something or someone. The central question in the midst of competing demands is whom would I want to risk everything for? Jesus is struggling with this question as he knows people are attracted to his life and ministry. Yet he is not sure whether it is because of who he is or what he does that attracts them. It is probably easier to describe a person by what they do rather than who they are. We watch a person’s actions as articulating a sense of what they truly value. Yet this is what Jesus’ tries to draw the disciple’s attention towards. It is not the miracles that make the difference to a person’s life even when they can restore a person to health, it is being drawn into a living relationship with God that makes the difference to how a person views the world and lives in it.

Our surrender to God’s loving presence makes all the difference. Yet we are reluctant to surrender ourselves to God because we fear that we will lose control over our lives and direction. Yet the very act of surrendering to God’s loving guidance actually involves us more in discovering our own hidden potential to bring life to others. This is certainly the experience of the saints. When they lost everything they gained everything and their lives burst open in joy towards God. This is not about working harder or longer but discovering that God’s wisdom and love at the centre of our living can be the most life giving thing we can help us to be present to others. What seems like a waste of time can be our most productive moment. It is important to discover that God seeks only the best for us which is when our lives bear fruit.

What bites us will heal us!

What bites you will heal you. This principle is often used in medicine to help the immune system trigger a response in the body to fight against the very thing which threatens to kill it. There is something counterintuitive about this because are natural instinct is to run away from that which will threaten to kill or destroy us. We become fearful of the things which seem to threaten our existence be they on the land or in the sea. We are familiar with stories about snake bites and shark attacks. Yet the main question is how we live in a land where we know that this is part of our natural fauna. How do we protect ourselves from that which can threaten to destroy us?

This is the question which Jesus puts in the scriptures when he talks about examining the things in life that can destroy our relationships with God and with each other. Last weekend this was examined in the light of the Ten Commandments and the actions which can undermine these relationships and make them toxic. Today’s Gospel is about bringing these actions into the light so that we can grow in our relationship with God. However, there can be a natural resistance to do this for fear that in exposing the sin we expose something of our own vulnerability and frailty. The fear is that if we acknowledge that which has damaged our relationships we will further damage ourselves.

The truth is that if we do not acknowledge the evils present in our society and the fact that they exist we cannot find remedies for these evils. Surely this is true in the stories we have read about over these weeks of Lent: the pleas for clemency for those convicted of drug trafficking, the need to face the reality of domestic violence, the dangers of homelessness, the effects of PTSD on troops returning home from active service and also the issues of child abuse within institutions. The acknowledgement that these things happen is the first step in seeking healing for people who have been bitten by these evils. By acknowledging the truth and bringing it light we discover it will not destroy us but it will provide healing to some of our most vulnerable people.

3rd Sunday of Lent

Touching on the sacred is at the heart of today’s Gospel. There is a need for people to encounter the living presence of God directly. The turning over of the tables in the temple is one of the most dramatic events in Jesus’ ministry and can be easily misunderstood. There is a sense in which the mediation between God and humanity had become distorted. More attention was spent on the transaction which exchanged a secular currency for a sacred currency in which sacrifice could be offered. Like any transaction there was an ability for people to make a profit at the expense of those who could least afford it. This exploitation of a person’s desire to enter into a wholesome and holy relationship with God was at the centre of these ritual practices. There was a sense in which the ritual practice kept God at arm’s length. Jesus recognized the importance of offering these sacrifices but also wanted people to enter into the relationship with God which was personal, intimate and life changing. Jesus wanted to say it was by offering himself that he opened a door to the sacred presence of God which others could follow. He was seeking to be the atonement which could make peace between people by offering what we could not do on our own. He was calling people to be at one with God.

In our lives we know this can be seeing in many aspects of life. There can be a sense in which people can make money out of what appear arcane areas of knowledge. It is one of the great challenges of our modern age for most professions. The introduction of the internet has made medical, business, academic and political knowledge more widely available. No longer can people be guardians of this knowledge because it can become available through a computer program or on google. There can be a similar recognition that the door to the sacred is wider now that it has ever been. Many people can offer their own interpretation or insight into the divine presence. In such an age there can be elements of truth which are present in what people write and say. But it can be confusing and people can be pulled in many different ways at once. There can even be a sense that when someone seeks to speak with authority on a certain topic and especially about God it can be treated with immediate skepticism.

How, therefore, are we called to discern where God’s spirit is leading us?

The first question is what do we consider to be our sacred space? This may well be a Church or a chapel but it could also be the place where we find ourselves able to open our hearts to God. It is important that this does not become too cluttered or complex. It should be able to be a place where we can be open to God and where we can be still.

The second question is how do we see ourselves as sacred space? This allows us the opportunity to understand that we are a temple of God’s Holy Spirit. We need to find a time when we can be open to God and a posture which allows us to be present. This may be sitting, kneeling, standing, lying face down or walking. We are human and we pray with the whole body.

The third question is how do we enter into the sacred space? The form of prayer can be as different as personalities. Some find an image can be helpful, others that a piece of scripture can lead them deeper, or even gazing upon a beautiful part of nature. Still others need to shut their eyes and come to a place of silence with a prayer word.

Having considered these questions we need to understand that we are entering into a relationship with the divine. It is important that we do not have preconceptions of what may happen but God we always open is heart to us which are consistent with scripture and with previous generations. God may not say much but he will always seek to bring life out of death, light out of darkness and hope out of despair.